Today I replaced the cable from the left pivot smart switch.

This is the factory made cable from my original game.

Upon inspection, the crimps are very poorly done on both sides.

The wire inside is very loose, higher than normal resistance on my meter.

The insulation is uncrimped, so now the contact part of the crimp has to somehow hold on by itself with no motion or vibration support:
terrible crimp (resized).jpg

Same on the other end:
terrible crimp other side (resized).jpg

The wires were melted together:
melted together (resized).jpg

New cable ready to be installed:
new cable ready to go (resized).jpg

With the new cable installed, the smart switch is twice as sensitive!

It works better than ever.

I was confident that the cable was wearing out, this proves it.

Tomorrow I make a new cable for the right pivot.

I imagine its in the same poor condition as the left.

This makes me wonder about the other wire crimps in the game.

Ill pay closer attention to them in the future.

I was thinking about that.

I dont see any high voltage in the wires that would cause melting.

But its likely, that as the unsulation degrades it melts into the wires near it.

In the smart switch cables this can wreak havoc.

I was stunned that the smart switch was TWICE as sensitive after replacing the cables and connectors.

The new switch worked ok, but it seemed dull and lifeless, and wasnt sensitive at all.

The poor crimping job on the contacts didnt help the situation all.

I hope to replace the right pivot cable today and see if its in the same poor condition.

Im installing the right (anubis) pivot smart switch cable.

Its pretty easy to unplug from the top and bottom (under the playfield) and remove it.

The cable tie mount fell off but left the old adhesive behind.

I found it easier to remove the anubis figure first, then access the cable and mount.

The most difficult/time consuming task was to remove the adhesive from the cable tie mount.

I put a small wad of paper towel with naptha on it and shoved it on top of the leftover glue.

After about 20 mins the glue scraped off with a plastic razor blade.

The new cable took all of 7 mins to make and dropped in easily thru the hole in the playfield.

Same crappy crimps, same melted together wire etc.

The weight of the "new" cable caused the mech to not close all the way.

Re-routing the wire under the playfield, and pushing it back up thru the hole a little and securing it with a cable tie made the mech close securely.
Now it snaps close like the other one (i had to do the same thing on that one).

Just as before (with the left pivot cable) the switch is TWICE as sensitive and more responsive.

The micro voltages from flexing the piezo material are negatively affected by loose corroded connectors.
This leads to slow response or again, HAVOC in the switch matrix.

Though the smart switches operate properly for millions of activations, the connectors and wire itself may not.

28 years in, the game just needs maintenance and a little TLC.

Interesting problem has appeared!

A ball got stuck in the left VUK.

The ball didnt register the opto switch closure.

At the same time a ball was stuck in the left outlane kicker.

The switch didnt register.

Upon re-booting the game both balls popped up and out and returned to the outhole properly.

Numerous switch tests and wire examinations turned up nothing.

Same issue popped up again during a long game.

The ball got stuck again in the left VUK and the game didnt know it was there.
The game also didnt go into ball search to pop it out.

Again rebooting the game caused the VUK to become active and the ball was retrieved normally.

This particular issue is a weird one.

I got a hint from and old archived MACAAP forum, Its been seen at least once before.

The issue was a loose or marginal connection on the return line connector on the CPU board A1J5.

I sprayed it with DeOxit and the problem went away!

I ordered new female connector housings from Newark Electronics to make replacement easy and organized.
a1j5 (resized).jpg

The female pins for these are currently difficult to get, Mouser, Digikey, and Newark dont have them in the exact type on the game.

Fortunately a vendor on Ebay had a nice 100 pak for a low price.

The connector is now replaced/re-pinned and has a new positive connection.

I will likely replace all the connectors on the CPU board as they are 30 years old.

The problem is fixed and I imagine all of the switch returns are now positive and reliable.

This is especially important for the Smart Switches, they really need positive connections on all sides.

Just to do a thorough job I decided it might be smart to replace the strobes connector A3J3:

re-pinning A3J3 (resized).jpg

It smart to leave a little wire, or at least be able to see into the old connector as a reference (just in case...).
Its easy to get confused. Cut them one at a time and pin them in, one at a time. Take a before picture that you can see the wire colors.

It really helps if you get distracted or make a mistake.

a3j3 old (resized).jpg
All switches test out perfectly in edge test.

All done! now I have NEW signal, and NEW return connections for my NEW CPU and driver board.

After some thought, I decided to replace the A3J4 connector too.

Its the strobe return lines for the lamp matrix.

Since the game "shares" the switch AND the lamp strobes, I felt it would be good to renew it.

A LOT has been said about poor grounding on System 3 games.

I havent personally seen anything wrong with my game pertaining to the grounds.

I did the ground mod and the game did "perk" up a bit. It seemed more energetic.

That said, nothing has been documented about replacing the ground connector on the driver board.

I ordered a few 8 position connector housings from Mouser.

Ill replace it when they come in.

8 position Mini-Fit connectors from Mouser came in this morning.

A great time to refresh the ground connector:
A3J7 ground connector (resized).jpg

Not surprisingly, the new connector fits in MUCH more firmly.

Upon re-reading the "grounds mods" posts and information.

Little is said about the board pins on this connection and possible corrosion of the pins in the harness housing.

Although there "IS" mention of connectors in the Pin-Wiki.

Either way, Its brand new now and should last another 30 years.

Finally my 28 year old, cracked and spidery ramp broke!

broken ramp (resized).jpg

The plastic is pretty thin.
Its pretty amazing how well this has held up over the years.

I imagine that I can glue it up and support it with fiberglass tape and epoxy.

It might hold up for awhile, but really it needs to be replaced.

Does anyone have a spare?

All of the usual vendors, including Pinball Resource, dont have them.

Should I have some made up?

I would likely have to make 50 of them to recoup the investment.

Does anyone else need a new ramp made out of PETG?

I have a lead on some new ramps.

Also Im going to rebuild the ball trough assembly since PBR still has the parts for it.

Ill post pictures when I do it.

New ramp installed!
ramp installed (resized).jpg

It didnt come with the wireform brackets.

I ordered them from PBR and the correct rivets.
gottlieb rivets (resized).jpg

The heads in the rivets are way too small from the factory. One side of my old ramp had actually pulled the rivets through the plastic.

I elected to install standard rivets with the bigger heads.
bigger rivets upper (resized).jpg
bigger rivets lower (resized).jpg

The bigger rivets DO NOT interfere with the ball as they are far enough from the sides.

The game play EXCEPTIONALLY WELL with the new ramp.

The ramp is ROCK solid and there is no sag in the center any more.

After the install The ball returns on the right side are super fast.

Its beginning to play like a brand new game.

The correct rivet size for the new plastic ramp is 5/32".

Drill out the bracket and ramp to 1/8" for the standard 1/8" wide nickel plated brass rivets.

No back-up washer is needed.

A couple posts in the internet asked the question of the correct size rivet.

Its 5/32" definitively.

5-32 rivets (resized).jpg

I finally got my hands on the LAST NOS playfield in EARTH.

This one has NO mylar and desperatly needs attention due to its age.

The clearcoat is checking/crazing:

It wont lift off the surface with a fingernail or the tip of an exacto knife, so Im calling it BONDED but shrinking?
Either way It has to be addressed.
clearcoat failing (resized).jpg

Serious "ribbing" in the surface:

terrible ribbing (resized).jpg

Inserts starting to raise:

raised inserts (resized).jpg

Its not glossy, none of them were.
The ink is showing signs of aging or "patina"
I like the way it looks this way:

not glossy (resized).jpg

I paid WAY too much for this, but fortunately I can make it perfect.

One SERIOUS problem is dis-similar coatings. I just DONT know what Gottlieb applied to the surface.
Obviously it was cheap paint, as it failed miserably over time and yellowed.
Possibly some kind of polycrylic varnish?

I "scrubbed" the surface with extra fine 800 grit sanding pads.
Still, it was so thin I rubbed through a keyline, but they are so poorly inked I have to redraw a lot of them.

Almost all NOS playfields benefit from a few keyline touch ups.

Very carefully applying a couple of thin lockdown coats of P2K.
Crossing my fingers that the old paint wont LIFT/crack/bubble etc.

First "mist" coat to lock down the finish:

1st lockdown coat (resized).jpg

crazing is improved:
crazing improved (resized).jpg

polycrylic cracking:

The cracking on most stargates is EXACTLY like this.

The keylines around the inserts were very lightly inked.

I repainted the keylines where needed. They are solid black now

I slightly lowered the inserts somewhat flush.

I ran another mist coat to lock down my paint touchups, then another to be sure.

Next I dribbled clear into the worst crevices and ran 2 medium coats of clear:

stargate NOS (resized).jpg

A few bubbles, but they will sand out.

bubbles in insert crevice (resized).jpg

Ribbing is mostly gone and the playfield is starting to flatten out:
flattening out (resized).jpg

The color is starting to "pop" and you can easily see the color separation between the colors now!

Tonight I'll sand it flatter, remove un-needed clear, and do a HEAVY coat of clear.

We will see how it looks in the morning.

It might need sanding and one more heavy coat to get ready for the buffer.

Its starting to look better.

Mylar can be cleaned and buffed out.

Just be careful not to burn thru it.

playfield is coming along.
it just needs flattening and buffing and remove unwanted texture:

crazing/cracking is corrected
crazing corrected (resized).jpg

final paint before buffing:

final coat 1 (resized).jpg
final coat 2 (resized).jpg

I waited 2 days to final sand and buff:

Machine "wet" sanded with 1200, 1500, 2000,3000 then 4000.

Buffed off with mirror glaze 205, finshed with high speed buff of show car polish 7:

final buffing (resized).jpg

There is one touch up that the black didnt match, but its not going to be noticeable when assembled.
Everything else is pretty good.

WAY better than the factory finish.

final buff 2 (resized).jpg
Mylar will not be needed on this playfield.

Thanks!

This is what I started with:

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/stargate-woes/page/4#post-7725306

Being the LAST NOS playfield on earth, it needed restoration.

It actually looks better today after 4 days of curing.

It will die back a bit over time.

I'll likely put another coat of clear before putting it in my game.

But thats 12 weeks from now. It has to dry.

I have been battling the ball count issue for awhile and its finally solved!

It seems it was not a ball count issue AT ALL!

The ball count was correct, I was getting EXTRA balls in play.

I was getting an effect like this:

The problem occurs ONLY if there is one ball in the trough and One ball drains.
This single ball causes the ball thats ready to be released to jump the gate-stop.

The effect occurs when the power is slightly UP.
The effect occurs during 3 ball multiballs mostly.

After the game warms up or is hot from playing a few games the problem goes away.
This is just due to some coil fade and less coil power throughout the game.

As this problem is intermittent, it was difficult to diagnose.

When the game cools off the problem returns.

The fix was pretty simple and would have worked in the case that was presented in the video above.

The outhole kicker on these system 3 games is pretty anemic, specifically to avoid the ball bouncing out past the gate.

To improve the outhole performance, I have unwound the outhole coil enough to bring the Ohms down to 10.5 ohms.

This has done WONDERS to keep the balls from accumulating in the outhole, or getting 2 balls in the trough to be kicked up the trough ramp.
The normal coil WONT kick 2 balls let alone 3.

Under examination, the ball sitting at the release gate is too high!

The centerline of the ball is WELL above the gate latch.

It takes very little force to "rattle" the ball over the latch.

This only really happens when there is only ONLY 1 ball at the end of the trough.

Multiple balls seem to absorb the shock pretty well.

The adjustment is in 2 parts:

Place #6 washers under the outhole release mech to raise it slightly, and to raise its centerline HIGHER than the centerline of the ball.

There are 4 screws to hold the mech in place. The washers go UNDER the mech's plate at each screw hole.

There is plenty of clearance for the latch to work with a single washer, 2 washers will bind up the latch.

part 2:

Where the ball rests at the end of the trough AT THE LATCH, bend the left inner rail of the trough ramp DOWN about 3/64".

Make this bend at a length of about 1" of the inner left rail.

You dont have to bend the right rail. If the ball is sitting too high still, feel free to bend down the right rail slightly.

I just used a nut driver and pounded it with my hand to bend the inner rails down a bit.

This causes the ball to rest more to the left in a slight "pocket".

The ball will still release properly, but cannot be "rattled" out and over the latch.

The right rail (that is now slightly higher than the left) will keep the ball "in-line".

With these adjustments, no matter how HARD you fire the ball at the release, it will stay in place.

The new playfield is GORGEOUS!

5 coats of clear machine sanded down did the trick.